Software to Redact Personal Data from Files

via Computerworld:Data Exposure: Using software to redact personal data from public documents

Algorithms, manual intervention are among the options used clean up online documents.

The personal data of millions of U.S. residents may have been exposed by the public posting of official documents, and local governments are increasingly looking for ways to automate the process of cleaning up data being put online.

Among the solutions available is redaction software that allows government agencies to remove sensitive personal data from the online images of public records. The software, which is being used in at least two Florida counties now, works in much the same way anti-spam software does — by using algorithms to analyze images for specific phrases or words.